CCEA Religion- Just War

What is war?

a state of armed conflict between different counties or different groups of people within a country

Tyler and Reid quote

‘God is presented as a god of action’

Joshua 6 quote

‘they devoted the city to the lord and destroyed with the sword every living thing’

Joshua 10 quote

‘he left no survivors… just as the lord, the god of israel, had commanded’

Micah quote

‘Nation will not take up sword against nation’

Matthew 5 quote

‘bless are the peacemakers’

Matthew 26 quote

‘put your sword back into its place; for those who live by the sword will die by the sword’

What did early christian’s believe about war?

they were pacifists and did not defend themselves, even when faced with the prospect of being fed to lions

What was the Edict of Milan?

the formal decree that devalued the christian faith must be tolerate within the empire → this means that christian’s had to fight

Augustine quote

‘it was right for christian’s to go to war in the interests of the state’

Augustine’s conditions for a just war

legitimate authority and a just cause

Aquinas’s conditions for a just war

‘right intention’

2 Luther quotes

war was the ‘will of god’ / we have a duty to ‘the earthly authorities through whom god operates’

What three further conditions did Francisco de Vitoria and Francisco Suarez add?

last resort, reasonable chance of success, proportionality

The Challenge of Peace: God’s Promise and Our Response quote (encyclical written by catholic bishops)

‘we are the first generation since genesis with the power to virtually destroy god’s creation. we cannot remain silent in the face of such danger’

What’s Jus as Bellum?

when is it right to go to war

What’s Jus in Bellum?

how should a war be fought?

What’s Jus post Bellum?

justice after war / not an official set of conditions, but recently there is a move towards adding them

7 clauses of Jus as Bellum

just cause, legitimate authority, comparison of justice, right intention, last resort, likelihood of success, proportionality

Just cause

war must only confront ‘a real and certain danger’ (Bowie)

Legitimate authority

a legitimate war must ‘not serve the interests of the few but those of the majority’

Criticism of legitimate authority

not every elected leader of a country is a legitimate authority / Robert Mugabe’s leadership of the gov → G8 countries issues a statement ‘we do not accept the legitimacy of any government that does not reflect the will of the zimbabwe people’

Comparison of justice

‘involves comparing the justices of the claims of both sides in a conflict’

Criticism of right intention

V+G criticise this part of the theory as right intention is difficult to justify / intention of 2003 invasion of iraq

CA of last resort

the international community’s reluctance to use force in rwanda ‘resulted in much greater injustice than a swift resort to force would have done’

Likelihood of success

stott says it’s foolish to go to war when one does not expect to win because thousands will needlessly sacrifice their lives

Proportionality in Jus as Bellum

bowie: ‘a state should not wage a war that causes substantially more suffering and destruction than the actual wrong done by the enemies’

The 2 clauses of Jus in Bello

proportionality, war must discriminate

Proportionality in Jus in Bello

the use of violence should be conditional to the threat of the enemy- minimum force should be used at all times

War must discriminate

a just war must discriminate between those involved in the fighting and those who are not involved

What is morally unacceptable due to war must discriminate?

carpet bombings / 40,000 killed in hamburg and 135,000 killed in dresden in WW2 bombing

What is the geneva convention?

a set of legally binding rules that apply in times of war and seek to protect people who are no longer taking part in hostilities eg the sick and POWS

Dr Serena Sharma quote

Jus post Bellum represents ‘for many, a logical and long overdue completion of the [Just War] tradition’

Prof Brian Orend quote

an opportunity to ‘strengthen the peace and justice of the international community system more broadly’

6 Jus post Bellum principles

rights vindication, proportionality, discrimination, punishment, compensation, rehabilitation

Rights vindication

those declaring victory ensure that the war has had an improving effect on the basic human rights of those whose vindication triggered the war

Proportionality in Jus post Bellum

a peace settlement should not serve as an instrument of revenge- final settlement should be reasonable and public

Discrimination

civilians should not be made to suffer from past conflict conditions imposed by the victor / eg kapos (jewish inmates forced to act as guards in camps) who were punished in gulags post war

punishment

orend: ‘the leaders of the regime… should face fair and public international trials for war crimes’

compensation

if financial compensation is imposed by the victors from the defeated nation, it must be reasonable so the defeated country can begin its own reconstruction

Rehabilitation

aims to provide long term security against future attack / rebuild security and revamp the education system

Bowie evaluation on just war

‘a framework to permit the use of violence in controlled circumstances’

Widdows evaluation on just war

‘attempts to respect the humanity of the enemy and to uphold morality even in times of conflict’

Bowie criticism of just war

‘too simplistic and impractical’

Jenkins criticism of just war

‘the conduct of soldiers in the heat of war is difficult to control’

Jenkins on nuclear weapons and just war

‘make a nonsense of the theory’

Eg of compliance w the conditions can only be applied in hindsight

War in vietnam - usa thought they’d be respectful